House of Commons - Education and Employment - Appendices to the Minutes of Evidence

Select Committee on Education and Employment Appendices to the Minutes of Evidence

APPENDIX 16

Memorandum submitted by the Child Poverty Action Group

CPAG welcomes the Education Sub-committee's enquiry into school meals. This submission concentrates on the steps that can be taken by schools and education authorities to promote healthy eating in schools.

1. SUMMARY

The development of the school meal service in the post-war years created a platform from which nutritional poverty affecting children could be tackled in a systematic way. Legislation in recent years has significantly altered this by restricting entitlement to free school meals to families on income support and income-based jobseeker's allowance, abolishing minimum nutritional standards and price controls.

Currently, children's diets generally are too high in sugar and fat and too low in fibre, some vitamins and minerals. Dietary deficiencies can affect both short and long term health. Under-nutrition, even in its milder forms, can have detrimental effects on concentration and school performance.

Benefit levels fall short of the amount needed to maintain an adequate living standard. Research into the impact of this shortfall on families found that unexpected expenses were met by cutting back on food and that reconciling quality with cost was difficult for parents. In a recent survey, 60 per cent of parents said that the school meal played a vital role in their children's health.

The introduction of minimum nutritional standards for school meals is welcome and should be accompanied by measures to encourage children in healthy eating. Most effective is a whole school approach linking curriculum messages to a creative high quality food service, offering a balanced diet at competitive prices.

The teaching of food skills (nutrition and cooking) should be reintroduced into the curriculum. The introduction of School Nutrition Action Groups should be encouraged to involve children, parents, teachers and caterers in creating school food policies. Other healthy eating initiatives such as fruit tuck shops deserve further attention.

Once school meal budgets are delegated, clear guidance must be set on what prices are "reasonable" if children are not to be excluded from school meals by cost.

The provision of hot meals should be reviewed and guidelines set as part of the delegation of school budgets in April 2000. In areas where hot meals have been withdrawn, parents have expressed concerns. Cold meals (though not necessarily nutritionally inferior) are seen as less satisfying. If paying children take to bringing packed lunches as a result, this may make the free meal children more obvious. Hot meals can also encourage children to sit together and reinforce dining skills.

In some areas as many as 40 per cent of school children entitled to free school meals do not take them up. Stigma, truancy and school exclusion may be among the reasons children do not take up free school meals. Research into reasons for low take-up should be prioritised so that appropriate steps can be taken to improve matters.

There are indications that stigma is a key factor. Some schools, for example, have separate queues for free meals. On the other hand, a number of schools take steps to avoid children being readily identifiable, for example by introducing swipe cards for all children. Good practice in the management, supervision and evaluation of school meals should be disseminated and pilot schools identified so new initiatives can be implemented and evaluated.

When family credit replaced family income supplement in 1988, entitlement to free school meals was withdrawn and a notional compensatory amount included in family credit. However, at such low levels of income, there is no guarantee that the compensatory amount would be put towards the cost of school meals rather than other basic essentials. For families getting housing benefit and council tax benefit, the value of the compensation is reduced by up to 85 per cent. Whilst the working families tax credit is more generous than family credit, it does not lift all working families out of poverty.

CPAG urges the Government to consider extending free school meal entitlement to children of tax credit recipients. By increasing the number of children entitled to free meals, stigma should be reduced and take-up increased. CPAG believes that extending free school meal entitlement to tax credit recipients would be an important step towards ending child poverty. Together with moves to improve nutritional standards and service delivery, it could form part of a strategy to improve the diets of school children.

If the cost is considered to be prohibitive, an alternative is to extend entitlement to only children under 11 and/or to adopt the formula for passporting tax credit recipients to health benefits (ie families with gross income of under £14,300 a year.)

2. HISTORY OF THE SCHOOL MEAL SERVICE

By the end of the 1970s the UK had a comprehensive school meals service, which on the whole had a decent level of free provision for children from poor families, whether working or not. There was some disquiet about rising prices and about a decline in nutritional standards—the Government had to encourage local authorities to adhere to the recommendations of the Working Party on the Nutritional Aspects of the School Meal[15]. However, the development of the school meal service in the post-war years created a platform from which nutritional poverty affecting children could be tackled in a systematic way. As the Government has recognised, legislation in recent years has significantly altered this:

"For nearly 18 years we have seen the quality of school dinners deteriorate and the number of children eating them drop significantly. Last year only 43 per cent of children took meals, compared with 64 per cent in 1979.[16]

Education Act 1980

The 1980 Education Act removed the statutory duty on local education authorities to provide a mid-day meal that was "suitable in all respects as the main meal of the day" (as enshrined in the Education Act of 1944). Instead, LEAs were only required to provide meals for children whose parents claimed supplementary benefit or family income supplement (forebears of todays's job seeker's allowance and working families' tax credit). LEAs could still provide free school meals on a discretionary basis to children from low-income families. Additionally, the Act also abolished both the minimum nutritional standards that controlled the quality of school meals and the fixed price "national charge".

Social Security Act 1986

The 1986 Social Security Act, which came into operation in 1988, introduced further changes to the system. The most important of these was to withdraw provision of free school meals from families receiving family credit (the re-named family income supplement) and to replace it with a notional amount included in the benefit. In one measure well over half a million children from low-income families lost their entitlement to a free school meal. The 1986 Act also required LEAs providing school meals and free milk to charge for them in all cases, except if parents received income support.

Without statutory nutritional standards, price controls or a mandatory requirement to provide a meal for all children, the national and comprehensive nature of the service was eroded and a system of provision determined mainly by the local authority area in which a person lives has been established. In effect, this has led to wide variation in the type, quantity and quality of school meals.

Delegation of Budgets

The final step in the transformation of the school meal service will come with the delegation of budgets to all secondary schools from April 2000. Secondary schools will have control over many additional aspects of their own budgets, including the provision of all school meals. It will also be possible for primary and special schools to control their own school meals budget, but it is widely felt that many will choose to stay under the wing of the local education authority.

Reintroducing nutritional standards

The current Government issued a consultation document Ingredients for Success,[17] in late 1998, showing that it was keen to put nutritional standards on the agenda. Following a wide range of responses from interested organisations, the Government announced that all providers of school meals would have to meet mandatory nutritional standards from April 2002.[18]

In the summer of 1998 the Government launched pilot sites for its Healthy School Initiative, which aims to ensure that schools use the resources at their disposal to improve the health and well-being of children and staff. The pilots, which are the recipients of special funding, will identify what works and what does not work, so that schools can start drawing on best practice to inform their own plans. Food and diet is one of the main concerns of the pilots.[19]

3. IMPROVING CHILDREN'S NUTRITION

"Food is a pleasure to be enjoyed . . . Food is also important for young people's immediate and future health. Schools can help young people develop good eating habits both through the food they offer and through the curriculum."

A healthy diet is essential to both maintain and protect children's health. It is particularly important in the early years. Inadequate nutrition impedes the cognitive development of children in ways that cause lasting damage. The effects of under-nutrition are often invisible, but even before they become severe and readily detectable, they have limited a child's ability to understand the world around them.

Diets of children

Currently children's diets are too high in sugar and fat and too low in fibre, some vitamins and minerals. Children from low-income families have particularly low intakes of folate and vitamins A and C. The Government's report The Diets of British Schoolchildren, published in 1989, concluded that young people depend for a significant proportion of their total intake of energy on three foods—chips, cakes and biscuits—at the expense of more nutritious options. [21]The recent Gardner Merchant survey shows that, despite various nutritional initiatives in schools, the most popular meal choices are still pizza and chips. [22]The Acheson Report, Inequalities in Health recommends that schools provide free fruit and restrict the intake of less healthy food. [23]

Poverty

The amount spent on food by families on low incomes is between £20-25 per week, depending on family size and age. [24]Unfortunately, many of the cheapest foods are generally the least nutritious—fatty, oily foods, often high in salt and sugar. It is far cheaper to fill up on a diet of fatty meat products, biscuits, sweets and white bread than healthier fresh fruit, vegetables and lean meat. The National Consumer Council report Budgeting for Food on Benefits shows that healthy food is beyond the budget of many of the poorest households in the country. [25]The Family Budget Unit study, Low Cost But Acceptable, also shows how benefit levels fall short of the amount needed to maintain an adequate living standard. [26]

Research into the impact of this shortfall in income on families found that: [27]

— Unexpected expenses had to be met by cutting back on food.

— Reconciling food quality with cost was difficult for parents.

— The cost of food and money available were the most important factors when deciding what foods to eat.

— Children tended to receive more of their preferred foods, such as chips, beans, burgers and fish fingers, than their affluent counterparts, because this avoided waste.

A survey of the nutrition and diet of lone parents found "the diets of income support claimants were much less likely to be adequate than those not claiming benefits. Households living in the worst deprivation had about half the nutrient intakes of parents not in such circumstances." [28]According to the National Food Survey 1997, low-income families eat more calories overall and get more of them from fat and sugar than high-income families. They also eat more salt, perhaps because the food is processed. These differences exclude any food that is eaten outside the home. [29]

Contribution of school meals to children's diets

School meals make an important contribution to the daily diet of children in the UK. According to the last major government research into school food they contribute between 30-45 per cent of children's daily energy intake, the higher proportion among low-income families. Children receiving free school meals are particularly dependent on school meals for their daily intake of vitamin C. [30]For many children, the school dinner is the main meal of the day. [31]

The 1999 Local Authority Caterers Association Survey found that 22 per cent of parents rely on a school meal to provide a balanced diet and that 60 per cent said that the school meal played a vital role in their children's diet. [32]

Impact of diet on health

Dietary deficiencies can affect short-term health, increasing the risk of dental problems due to high quantities of sugar in diets, anaemia from insufficient intake of iron, folic acid or vitamin B12, obesity and general weight gain. In the longer term poor diet may increase the risk of coronary heart disease, strokes, diabetes and problems with bone mass due to insufficient calcium intake. Some cancers are also believed to relate to a low intake of fresh fruit and vegetables.

Impact of diet on educational attainment

The most recent academic research from the United States, by J Larry Brown, suggests that "poor children who attend school hungry perform significantly below non-hungry income peers on standardised test scores" argues that there is "compelling evidence that under-nutrition—even in its "milder" forms—during any period of childhood can have detrimental effect on the cognitive development of children and their later productivity as adults. In ways not previously known, under-nutrition impacts on the behaviour of children, their school performance and their overall cognitive development." [33]This research is important and should be followed up with UK-based studies.

Short-term nutritional deficiencies, such as missing a meal, can affect a child's ability to concentrate and perform complex tasks. There is some evidence from the United States that improved nutritional content of school meals resulted in significant increases in student scores on standardised tests. [34]Measures taken included cutting the amount of refined sugar, eliminating artificial colours and flavours, limiting preservatives and increasing the number of fruits, vegetables and whole-grain foods. The key seems to be that food has to be fresh. Schauss also reports other studies that indicate that children given dietary supplements, particularly vitamin C, experience an average overall gain of four points on SAT tests, although there is some debate about these findings.

Promoting healthy eating to support nutritional standards

CPAG welcomed the Government's plans to introduce minimum nutritional standards for school meals by May 2002. [35]For nutritional standards to be effective, they should be accompanied by measures to encourage children in healthy eating. School offers the best opportunity to influence the diets of children, leading to savings in health and social care budgets, both now and later. Research by psychologists suggests that tastes and preferences can be shaped by the environment in which children eat and by introducing them repeatedly to different foods. [36]Most effective is a "whole school" approach, linking curriculum messages to a creative high quality food service, offering a balanced diet at competitive prices.

Food skills

Dr S Stitt, University College of St Martin, Lancaster has attributed the over-reliance on nutritionally inferior pre-cooked convenience food in children, to a lack of food skills (ie, nutrition and cooking). Countries such as Britain, New Zealand, Canada and Ireland, where the teaching of food skills has declined in the classroom, have seen the greatest increase in reliance on convenience foods and a measurable decline in the health of the population. Countries such as Iceland, Finland, the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain, where the centrality of food skills has been retained in schools, have a superior quality of diet and better health. The British Medical Association recently recommended that the school curriculum include nutritional and cooking skills, with an emphasis on providing healthy meals on a low income. [37]

Research at the University of Bangor showed that children could learn to like fresh fruit and vegetables. Children were shown videos, portraying fruit and vegetables in a positive way, and were encouraged to try small quantities. After they had sampled the food more than a dozen times they would choose them rather than chocolate bars. This change was sustained over many months and even transferred to their homes. [38]

School Nutrition Action Groups

Furthermore, the involvement of children in the decision making process is crucial. One successful way of promoting nutrition in schools is by introducing School Food Committees or School Nutrition Action Groups (SNAGS). These should involve children, parents, teachers, caterers and have the option to co-opt specialist nutritionists to create school food policies.

The Gardner Merchant report shows that in schools where these exist healthy eating is more commonly discussed, children think healthy eating should be encouraged, more pupils consume fresh fruit and parental satisfaction with school food is higher. The Healthy English Schoolchildren report recommends that all schools be required to establish these groups.

Torquay Grammar School did exactly this in 1997. By involving students, parents, teachers, governors, caterers, the school nurse and the community dietician, the school made healthy eating and nutritional education a central feature of school life. Sales of nutritionally balanced meals have risen to 25 per cent of all and 85 per cent of children purchase school lunches daily. [39]

A similar scheme was set up in a school in one of the most deprived areas of Scunthorpe by the community dietician, Jennifer Davies, and the health promotion specialist, Tina May Ward, together with a member of staff and the catering contractors. Healthier eating options are now a regular feature at the school's newly named "Ridge Diner". According to Jennifer Davies, "the aim of the project is to increase the uptake of healthier food options by pupils and staff within a pleasant, health-promoting environment". The school has already noticed an increase in the use of school meals by the students. [40]

Cash cafeterias

The Healthy English Schoolchildren report suggests that cash cafeterias should be prohibited in primary schools, as it is inappropriate to expect children of this age to make informed choices. Secondary school children have more scope for choice and it is important that the differing nutritional needs of boys and girls are addressed. It is suggested that meal times be staggered, with 11-13 year-olds being served first, with a different menu offered to older children.

Tuck shops—Examples of good practice

Schools need to take steps to ensure that the contribution made by nutritional standards in school meals is not undermined by vending machines and school tuck shops.

The Edinburgh Community Food Initiative (ECFI), with support from Edinburgh council, is currently piloting a school fruit shop initiative. This aims to encourage children, particularly those in low-income areas, to develop a habit of eating fruit from an early age. Schools will be encouraged to set up their own fruit shops, which will be able to buy fruit at cost price. Children who receive free school meals get free vouchers for two pieces of fruit a week and other parents and pupils will be able to buy 10p vouchers, worth one piece of fruit. According to the ECFI, "Vouchers mean pupils can only buy fruit, that they don't have to carry money and that pupils on free school meals aren't stigmatised." It is also hoped that the scheme will help remind parents of the educational and lifestyle benefits of healthy eating and help reinforce the healthy eating message the pilot school is already promoting[41].

Wolsey Primary School in New Addington, South London, has recently received a lot of media coverage of its fruit tuck shop project. This began, three years ago, in one classroom and has now developed throughout the whole school[42]. The school's head, Peter Winder, argues that getting high-sugar, high-fat snacks and junk foods out of its tuck shop and replacing them with fruit has been central in transforming the eating habits of the children, their behaviour and academic performance. This project has prompted a lot of critical discussion32[43] and deserves further attention from all those interested in nutritional standards.

It is estimated that around half a million children do not take a school meal because of cost. [44]The abolition of fixed price charging for school meals in the 1980 Education Act opened the way for variations in pricing policy throughout the UK. For example, under the current local authority arrangements, a family living in Devon with one child at primary and one child at secondary school faces an annual cost of around £476 for school meals. For a family moving onto WFTC this would certainly be a significant financial consideration. However, if the same family lived in Lancashire the charge would be £620—an additional cost of almost £150.

Impact of the delegation of budgets on cost

The delegation of budgets to individual schools could exacerbate this. The DfEE consultation paper stated that "the Government expects schools not to undermine the duty to provide paid meals by charging unreasonably high prices".[45] Guidance is to be issued. [46]This guidance must be clear if children are not to be excluded from school meals by cost. Of equal concern is that the delegated budget for school meals is not ring-fenced. In effect, the school can spend the school meal budget in whatever way the governors choose.

Grant-maintained schools already have control of their school meal services. A recent National Audit Office report found "...significant price variations across 10 schools" who had contracted catering out. [47]For example, the average price of a two-course main meal with potatoes and another vegetable, a hot or cold sweet, and a drink ranged from £1.40 to £2.20." In 11 schools where catering was provided in-house the cost of a school meal ranged between £1.10 and £2.00.

The report further outlined the wide variation in price of the most popular items sold and presented the table below as an example. Whilst acknowledging that portion size may account for some of the differences it should be of concern that in one school a portion of quiche may cost more than twice as much as in another. [48]


	Price range	Variation	Average price
	in pence	%	in pence

Pizza	40-70	75	52
Cheese and onion pasty	45-73	62	54
Quiche	40-90	125	60
Chicken and mushroom pie	50-75	50	60
Sausage roll	35-45	29	42
Chipped potatoes	40-65	63	50
Baked beans	18-30	67	23
Cheese sandwich	60-80	33	67
Cola	40-50	25	44
Orange juice	30-45	50	38
Crisps	22-30	36	25

Some grant-maintained schools have sought to break even on school meal provision, other have subsidised provision, and yet others have viewed the school meals service as an income-generating exercise.

Inevitably, such variations in budgeting and pricing leave low-income working families in the most expensive local authority areas, or schools, considerably out of pocket. The question for the Government, which itself has argued that: "Schools should . . . be aware that school meal take-up is extremely price sensitive"[49], is—should a low-income family, or any family for that matter, be financially penalised and the provision of a school meal to a child put into doubt simply because of the area in which they live?

Hot meals?

Where a child lives also affects the type of food that is provided. Since the 1980 Education Act came into force, a number of local authorities have withdrawn the hot meals service that had previously been in place. The consultation document on nutrition, Ingredients for Success, argues that LEAs and schools should decide on whether they wish to provide hot food[50].

Whilst the nutritional value of a hot meal is not necessarily higher than a cold meal, there are many who feel that the provision of a hot meal is important for school children. It is the case that in November in the British Isles few people eat cold food as their main meal at home. It does seem, therefore, an unusual proposition that such an arrangement would be acceptable for growing school children. In a 1999 study of school meal provision in Edinburgh, based on interviews with parents and children, hot meals were preferred—"hot meals are nicer, cos if you get a cold meal it's just like sandwiches and crisps and that doesn't even fill me up." [51]

Hot food is also seen as comforting, more substantial and a more appealing alternative to a packed lunch provided by the school. Its provision will also offer a choice, which is very important in a competitive food market place. It might be the case that if parents are to be encouraged to use the school meals service, hot meals need to be available.

The impact of the withdrawal of hot meals on children who receive free school meals should also be acknowledged. Gill, a lone parent of two, lives in West Sussex where the hot school meal service has just been withdrawn and replaced by a sandwich service prepared outside the county. She contacted CPAG to explain how her family will be hit by the cut:

"I am on income support and my two children rely on free school meals. However, West Sussex has recently decided to scrap our hot school meals. It is now even more obvious who the free school meal children are, as better-off parents are resorting to a packed lunch. I have, therefore, forfeited my entitlement to school meals and provide my own packed lunch for my children. This is very hard financially and makes a very significant difference to our budget, but I do not feel that it is fair to put my children through this stigmatisation."

The cost of a packed lunch for Gill's two children is over £6 a week and has to be found from the existing weekly food budget of £30. In effect, the family food budget for breakfast and evening meal has been cut by 20 per cent. [52]

There is also a perception that hot food provision requires children to sit together and to use and reinforce the dining manners that they will have been taught at home. If such everyday values are not being learned at home, schools can be the place where some children acquire these skills and can be socially included.

Evidently, further investigation into the issue of hot school meal provision is needed. The Government should review the provision of hot school meals and ensure that guidelines are set on this matter as part of the delegation of school budgets in April 2000.

4. TACKLING LOW TAKE-UP

The Government has clearly stated that it intends to introduce mandatory nutritional standards for all school meals from April 2002. This is welcome. However, it is vital that new research into why some children entitled to free school meals do not take them up is prioritised. The whole system of nutritional standards will be undermined if a third of a million of the poorest children do not make it to the dinner queue.

In some areas take-up is much worse than in others. In some London boroughs over one third of school children miss out on a school meal to which they are entitled. Secondary schools in the North East also show high rates of non-take-up—as high as 40 per cent. [53]That so many children who live in poverty are not eating such an essential meal should be of concern to us; given that one in four children do not get a hot dinner in the evenings, [54]they may be missing out on their main hot meal of the day. Research shows that there are a number of reasons for the non-take-up of free school meals.

Stigma

A key factor is the stigma that is attached to the provision. Some schools still have separate queues for free meals, other children can be made to wait until paying children have received their lunch. In schools with cash cafeterias "cashless" children are easy to identify. For some children simply being identified in such a way is enough to prevent take-up. Unfortunately for others, the stigma of receiving free meals can be made even more traumatic by bullying from other pupils. [55]In 1982, following media coverage on the issue, a single mother wrote to CPAG explaining the problem that she currently faced:

"I explained to my eldest son that we could claim free school meals. If you could have seen the look of horror on his face you would understand why I don't claim."

This view was supported by the last large scale study of school meal provision, conducted by the Office of Population, Censuses and Surveys in 1979 and published in 1981. Among the random sample of 16,000 families the study found that 20 per cent of parents eligible to claim free school meals did not do so because they were concerned that their children would be picked on. Then, as now, many children did not claim their free dinner for fear of being seen as different. [57]

A generation later, whilst some children go to schools that are taking steps to avoid stigma other children still have to face being readily identified and, in some cases, teased or bullied as a result of the way the free school meal is provided. At a recent meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Poverty in the House of Commons, 14 year old James Roberts said:

"Kids whose parents don't have much money are forced to go to the cheap shops and if anyone sees them then they get picked on in the estate and at school. My friend and I have both had these problems. You also get picked on in school if you get a free school dinner ticket; you get called things like poor boy, scavenger and things that are a bit rude and I'm not allowed to repeat. This makes us feel sad and sometimes angry with them and then we get into trouble and get called trouble makers by teachers, which makes it worse."

Dealing with stigma

Whilst it would be almost impossible to make free school meal children invisible in all cases there are steps that a number of schools currently take that avoid children being readily identifiable.

Some small primary schools allow children to hand in an envelope at the central administrative office and all children are issued with the same dinner ticket irrespective of paying status. Other larger schools accept payment in an envelope with the name of the child on it carried out in the classroom at the beginning of the week. In such cases, it is not obvious which envelopes contain notes and which do not.

Some secondary schools with cash cafeterias are introducing electronic school meal cards, issued to all students with only the electronic cash till and cashier able to recognise a free school meal card. In March 1999 BBC News Online reported that Parliament Hill School in the London Borough of Camden had issued all of its pupils and staff with a swipe card, allowing them to pay for school meals using a cashless, electronic payment system. Parents send the school a cheque or cash that is then credited to the card. When the pupils buy food in the canteen the money is automatically deducted. The school introduced the system, in part, to stop bullies taking money from school children. It also wanted to stop children receiving free school meals selling their dinner tickets to other pupils. According to the school, the trade in dinner tickets can mean that children most in need of a hot school meal often go without. [58]

Aberdeen City Council's education department is currently piloting smart cards. According to the authority—"The card means that no cash changes hands and, therefore, it is impossible for pupils to know which children receive free school dinners. It is hoped that the card will reduce the stigma associated with receiving free school meals and actually increase uptake." Pending successful evaluation, the Accord Card will be rolled out across the rest of the city. [59]

There are numerous examples of smart card technology being introduced to improve lunch-times by shortening queues and reducing bullying. Whilst smart card systems may, at first, require some maths on the part of the student, anecdotal evidence suggests that the regular pricing and portion structure of most school meals services makes identification as a free school meal student much less likely.

CPAG supports the Edinburgh School Meal Action Group in recommending that good practice in the management, supervision and evaluation of school meals should be disseminated and pilot schools identified so that models of good practice can be implemented and evaluated. [60]

Other reasons

Some of the non-take-up is due to children who are absent from school because of sickness or because some parents on benefit simply fail to register for the service because they fear stigmatising their own children. [61]

It may also be the case that truancy and the increasing number of permanent exclusions, of which there were over 12,000 by the end of the school year in 1998[62], also account for some of the non-take-up. According to the Children's Society report, No Lessons Learnt, 135,000 children were temporarily excluded in 1995-96. The 1997 Education Act extended the maximum period for a fixed term exclusion from 15-45 days. These are issues that require further research, particularly given that when a child is away from school, parents on income support have the additional cost of providing the mid-day meal.

5. EXTENDING ENTITLEMENT TO FREE SCHOOL MEALS

One in three school children in the UK—around 2.8 million—currently live in poverty. Yet only about 1.8 million children are entitled to a free school meal. Of these, around 300,000 (20 per cent), for a variety of reasons, do not take up their entitlement. There are, therefore, around a million children living in poverty who do not get a free school meal.

The importance of free school meals for children on low incomes was most recently emphasised by the Acheson report on health inequalities, published in late 1998. This report, commissioned by the Government, argued ". . . there may be a case for extending provision of free school lunches to include children from poor families who are not currently entitled, in order to relieve overall pressure on the family food budget, and improve the nutrition of other family members." [63]

Who gets free school meals

Children whose parents are in receipt of income support or income-based jobseeker's allowance are entitled to free school meals. Children whose parents received family income supplement (the precursor of family credit) were also entitled. When family credit replaced family income supplement, entitlement to free school meals was withdrawn for working families. A notional amount, based on the average cost of school meals at that time[64] was included in family credit rates, to compensate for the loss of free school meals.

The introduction of working families' tax credit

Whilst the working families' tax credit is more generous than family credit, it is questionable that all those will be lifted out of poverty or that all of those who move into work could stand the withdrawal of school meals. Research by the Family Budget Unit found that a couple with two children under 11 and one full-time earner require £234.60 a week to meet a low cost but acceptable living standard. [65]This is the "income threshold below which good health, social integration and satisfactory standards of child development are at risk."

The introduction of working families tax credit increases the number of families able to meet a "low cost but acceptable" budget. However, a significant number will have insufficient income to meet it. Taking the example of a couple with two children under 11, CPAG estimates that they will not have sufficient income to meet a low cost but acceptable budget if they earn less than the current average for family credit claimants (£129 gross per week55[66]) Further measures are therefore needed.

Case study

Julie, a lone parent with four children from London, wrote to CPAG explaining the difficulty she was experiencing making ends meet in low-paid work. With family credit, her total income was £337 and her total expenditure £360, leaving a shortfall of £23 a week. With the introduction of WFTC, CPAG calculated that Julie's income should rise by £30.55 to £367.55 a week, giving her a budget surplus of £7.55 a week. Yet, her budget for food and clothes were low and there was no allowance for leisure activities. Currently Julie pays £800 a year (£20 a week) for her three school-aged children to have school dinners. It is evident that providing free school meals as part of her WFTC would give her the financial space to breathe and encourage her to stay in work.

Adequacy of tax credits

Although the Family Budget Unit's report provides a useful contribution to the "how much is enough?" debate, CPAG would like to see the Government establish a minimum income standard—setting a level of income necessary to respect human dignity and combat social exclusion. [67]The number of families with incomes below this level should be included in the Government's Poverty Audit. As Sir Doanld Acheson pointed out, sustained action is required to narrow the discrepancies between benefit levels and the needs of families. [68]

School meals for tax credit recipients

CPAG urges the Government to consider extending free school meal entitlement to children of tax credit recipients. By increasing the number of children entitled to free meals, stigma should be reduced and take-up increased. CPAG believes that extending free meal entitlement would be an important step towards ending child poverty. Together with moves to improve nutritional standards and service delivery, it could form part of a strategy to improve the diets of school children.

The compensatory amount in family credit, is an inadequate substitute for free meals because:

— At such low levels of income, there is no guarantee that the compensatory amount would be put towards the cost of school meals rather than other basic essentials. As stated above, even after the introduction of tax credits, further steps are needed to tackle poverty for families in work.

— For families getting housing benefit and council tax benefit, the value of the compensation is reduced by up to 85 per cent. This is because the extra income is taken into account in calculating housing benefit and council tax benefit entitlement.

[69]to £1.26 in 1999. By contrast family credit for a family with one child under 11 rose from £38.15 in 1987 to £65.30 in 1999, an increase of 71 per cent. This problem could be exacerbated if prices rise in some places after budgets are delegated to schools.

In debate on this issue in the House of Lords, Baroness Hollis of Heigham objected that financial compensation had been introduced because not all children took up the free meals to which they are entitled. [70]As previously stated, CPAG believes that steps should in any case be taken to improve take-up.

An alternative—extending entitlement to some tax credit families

If the cost is considered prohibitive, then a (less desirable) alternative would be to extend free meals only to children under 11. The cost could also be limited by providing free school meals to children of only some tax credit recipients, by using the formula the Government has adopted for passported NHS benefits. Families with gross incomes of under £14,300 a year will be entitled to NHS benefits such as free prescriptions. The formula is designed to ensure that "tax credit recipients with less than half the average family income will be guaranteed rights to passported benefits".[71] It is expected that 1 million of the 1.4 million families on tax credits will be covered (ie around 70 per cent of recipients.) Adopting this formula could mean however, that larger families with incomes over the limit but higher expenses do not get the free school meals they need.

As a minimum, we would urge the Government to adopt the recommendation of the Social Security Committee and extend free school meals to families who are awarded WFTC or DPTC who have been in receipt of income support or jobseeker's allowance in the period immediately preceding the award. [72]

How much would it cost?

The cost of extending free school meals to all children of working families tax credit (WFTC) recipients in the UK as a whole is £410 million (£210 million for children under 11). [73]If the formula for passporting families to NHS benefits were also adopted for free school meals, the cost would be reduced to £287 million for children of all ages and £147 million for children under 11.

October 1999

15 The School Meals Service, Nan Berger, Northcote House, 1990 pp 50-51. Back

16 David Blunkett, Secretary of State for Education and Employment. DfEE Press Release 139/97 10 June 1997. Back

17 Ingredients for Success, DfEE, 1998. Back

18 Department of Health (DoH) Press Release 0462, 27 June 1999. Back

19 DoH Press Release 0219, 2 June 1998. Back

20 Introduction to "Eating Well at School" Departmental dietary guidance for school food providers" 1997. Back

21 Department of Health, The Diets of British Schoolchildren, TSO 1989. Back

22 Gardner Merchant, What Are Today's Children Eating? Gardner Merchant 1998. Back

23 Sir D Acheson: An Independent Inquiry into Inequalities in Health, Stationery Office, 1998. Back

24 Office for National Statistics, Family spending: A Report on the 1996-97 Family Expenditure Survey, Stationery Office 1997. Back

25 National Consumer Council, Budgeting for Food on Benefits, 1994. Back